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Sopa de Pescado a la Donostiarra
Created by Chef Isabel
Sopa de pescado a la Donostiarra belongs to San Sebastián: a deep fish stock, slow vegetables, dense sopako bread, and the shellfish added only at the end.
Sopa de pescado a la Donostiarra is Basque, from San Sebastián, and it is not a thin fish broth with a few polite pieces floating in it. It is cocina de cuchara, spoon food: a stock made from rockfish heads, bones, and shells, a slow sofrito, the onion base cooked until sweet, and sopako bread that thickens the soup until it holds the taste of the sea.
The method that decides it is the stock. Use heads and bones from hake, monkfish, red mullet, gurnard, or any good rockfish your fishmonger has, plus shrimp shells if you have them. Simmer gently and briefly, then strain hard. Boil it for an hour and you pull bitterness from the bones. Treat it well and the soup tastes deep without turning heavy.
If you can't find pan sopako, use a dense stale country loaf, toasted dark, not soft sandwich bread. It won't taste exactly of Donostia, but it will give the soup its body. Add the clams, mussels, and hake at the end, because shellfish waits for no one. Siempre sale, si lo sigues.
Ingredients
fish heads, bones, and trimmings
Quantity
1kg
from hake, monkfish, gurnard, red mullet, or rockfish
raw shrimp with shells
Quantity
250g
peeled, shells reserved
cold water
Quantity
2 litres
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| fish heads, bones, and trimmingsfrom hake, monkfish, gurnard, red mullet, or rockfish | 1kg |
| raw shrimp with shellspeeled, shells reserved | 250g |
| cold water | 2 litres |
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